Function Description

aServer-J-100Z comes with a preinstalled witness node operating system, with eth0 as the management interface and the default IP address of 10.250.0.7/24. To log in to the aServer-J-100Z console, configure an IP address on the same segment as the PC, connect to eth0, and visit https://10.250.0.7/ in your browser.

The default username and password for the admin account are both admin. During your first login, you will be prompted to change the default password. You will be forced to change it if the password has not been changed one month since the prompt. After the first successful login, you need to change the default IP address and make sure that the new IP address and gateway can communicate with HCI clusters.

Precautions

1. A witness datastore of 2 nodes and 1 witness node is available for newly created clusters only. If only 2 nodes are deployed for an existing witness datastore, the deployment mode cannot be changed to 2 nodes and 1 witness node after the upgrade.
2. In a cluster adopting the deployment mode of 2 nodes and 1 witness node, you cannot create two datastores by disk (which is only available if there are at least three nodes).
3. The deployment mode of 2 nodes and 1 witness node supports two replicas but not three replicas.
4. A virtual datastore of 2 nodes and 1 witness node does not support Oracle RAC and shared disks (which are supported if there are at least three nodes).
5. Witness nodes of VMs cannot be cloned or snapshot.
6. If a virtual datastore with 2+1 environment is expanded to three or more nodes, the witness copy needs to be migrated to an HCI node. The migration may be time-consuming if the witness copy has a large number of files.

Prerequisites

This function is available for HCI 6.7.0 R3 and later.

Procedure

1. Configure the storage network.

Go to Nodes > Communication Interfaces > Storage Interface and connect the storage interfaces of two HCI hosts in the storage network. The storage WAN does not require 10GE switches and is cost-effective. The active/standby mode must be used for standard link aggregation for the storage LAN.

If a 10GE switch is deployed, you are advised to use the layer 4 load balancing mode for standard link aggregation.

2. Add the witness device to the cluster over the management network.

Go to Nodes > Nodes > Add Witness Node. Add the witness device to the cluster.

3. Create a datastore and add two nodes and the witness device to it.

4. If a witness node is available, the disk is automatically set to Witness Disk and cannot be changed.

5. The configuration is completed.